Butterfly on a Wheel 2007

Lives will be broken

6.407 / 10   498 vote(s)
R
Crime Drama Thriller

A sociopathic kidnapper methodically pushes a desperate pair of parents to their absolute breaking point.

Release Date 2007-07-27
Runtime 1h 35m
Directors Mike Barker, Ashley Rowe
Producers William Morrissey, William Vince, David Valleau, Martin Bigham, Marina Grasic, Julia Blackman, Ron McLeod, Michael Potkins, Beau St. Clair, Jeff Abberley, Bruce Davey, Pierce Brosnan
Writer William Morrissey

Never pick a fight with someone who's got nothing to lose.

Butterfly on a Wheel (AKA: Shattered) is directed by Mike Barker and written by William Morrissey. It stars Pierce Brosnan, Maria Bello and Gerard Butler. Music is by Robert Duncan and cinematography by Ashley Rowe.

Butler and Bello play a seemingly happily married couple who have an adorable young daughter into the fold. Enter a rather sinister Brosnan who announces he has kidnapped the daughter and requires the couple to do everything he asks. Pressure is on then!?

Basically this is just real solid kidnap thriller film making, the kind that we were well served with back in the 1980s, and with that in mind this comes off like a throw back to that decade. Brosnan (how nice to see him doing a natural Irish brogue) grows ever more spiteful, while of course our handsome couple get more frantic.

But naturally there's a mystery going on here, we are left in no doubt about that there is something lurking beyond the edges of the frames. To which the inevitable twist, on which the whole pic's very being depends upon, will either make or break how you ultimately feel about the piece as a whole.

I liked it. 7/10

John Chard